Welcome back friends to our
study in the book of Hebrews
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We are in Hebrews Chapter
8 and we are focusing on the
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new covenant, the new
experience that God wants
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us to have with Him.
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As we pointed out before,
the break there are a number
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of facets to the new covenant
and each one of them needs to
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be understood as we move
through Chapter 8 verses 10-13.
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First of all, we see here James,
that the covenant involves a
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promise of God, that He will
write His law in our hearts,
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in our minds, God will do this.
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How is it that God is
going to bring to pass?
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How is it that God is going to
be the One who fulfills the law
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or writes it in us?
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You know this is really powerful
Ty, because this is just a
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continuation of the theme
that Paul has been building
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The immutable promises of God.
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One of those
immutable promises that God has
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made to us is His Word.
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He has established His
word as the power and authority
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by which He can realize,
or make real in our lives.
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Everything He is
giving to us in His promises
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That He has promised to us.
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So the Word is powerful,
the oath of God is powerful,
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and it is through His
word that He establishes
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His law in our hearts.
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It is through the power,
the grace, the goodness of God
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that comes through His
word that he establishes the law
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in our hearts and in our minds.
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I will put My law in your mind,
I will write it on your heart.
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That's a powerful promise!
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Now it is important that we
understand that this promise
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is throughout Scripture.
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It's just not a
promise that comes to us in the
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New Testament period.
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Actually this is echoing
from Chapter 36 of Ezekiel where
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similar language is used.
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It's says in Chapter 36
of Ezekiel verses 26 and 27.
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"I will give you a new heart
and I will put a new Spirit
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within you, I will
take away the heart of stone
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out of your flesh and I will
give you a heart of flesh. "
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"I will put My Spirit within
you and cause you to walk in
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My statutes and you will
keep My judgments and do them. "
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I love the fact that God says
here, I'm going to cause you,
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I'm not going to force you.
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I'm not going to manipulate
you, I'm not going to bare
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over you with any kind of
dominance, rather I am going
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to work from the inside out.
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I'm going to work on the inside
of your being, give you a new
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heart, a new Spirit, a new
attitude, Paul says in Chapter 2
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of Philippians, like this mind
or this attitude to be in you.
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Which was also in Christ Jesus.
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God is going to work on
the inside of our hearts
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as a result of that internal
change there is going to be
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an external change, I will cause
you to walk in my statutes,
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and in My law.
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God's the cause, but
He doing it through us
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with our cooperation.
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Now I like the latter part of
this verse, too, verse 10 says,
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"And I will be to them a God and
they shall be to Me a people. "
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That is talking
about relationship.
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This is the theme we have
been building on as we've been
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moving through the book
of Hebrews, relationship.
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It began in Chapter 1, God has
spoken to us and He speaks to us
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through the Son, and
he's continued this theme
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all the way through. Why?
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Cause right here in Hebrews
8, we are kind of coming to a
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Zenith, if you will, a summary
ad culmination of the point
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that Paul is trying to make.
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God wants a
relationship with His people.
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I want to be your God and
I want you to be My people.
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He created us, in the beginning,
in His image, and He had that
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relationship with
us from day number 1.
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Sin interrupted
this relationship.
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God wants to
restore the relationship.
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In other words, the new covenant
is not just about I am going to
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put the law in their hearts
and they are obey Me and they
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are going to
keep the Commandments.
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Not that dryness that we
see sometimes in religionaity.
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It's about experience,
it's about love, because the law
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is based on love.
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It's about God and us coming
together in a relationship
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that honors and respects
one another, and falls in love
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with one another and
thereby we find ourselves having
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His law in our hearts and minds.
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Praise the Lord, AMEN!
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That's why we are told James,
in Romans 13:10, that love is
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the fulfillment of the law.
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We're not talking here
about a mere code of ethics,
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that we obey with a
grudging unwilling heart,
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but rather it's an
experience that we see reflected
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in the experience of the
Lord Jesus Christ when He said,
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"I do always those
things that please God. "
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There is this sense, this
tone in Jesus in which He longs
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to please the Father.
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He's not merely obeying as
a legalistic requirement in
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order to get on the good
side of an angry God, but rather
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what Jesus is bringing to
us in the new covenant is a
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a change of heart, a change
of motive, a change of attitude,
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a change of perception of God's
character such that we begin
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to get inclined toward God.
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to love what God
loves, to hate what God hates,
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our tastes literally.
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Our spiritual tastes,
our moral tastes is changed
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by this internal transformation.
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So this idea that there is a
difference between love and law.
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That law is Old Testament
legalism and what we need
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today is love, is not Biblical.
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It's a false dichotomy.
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Yeah, all through the New
Testament we find that the
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essence, the basis
of love, is the law,
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or law of love, it's the same.
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In other words, not just in
Romans but in Galatians Paul
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says love is the
fulfilling of the law.
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Jesus was asked once about which
commandment was most important.
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And Jesus said, the first
commandment, the most important
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commandment is to love God.
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The commandment, the law, is
to love God with all your heart,
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mind and soul, and the
second is just like it,
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love your neighbor, law,
love your neighbor as yourself.
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When you look at
the commandments you see
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essence of love.
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Love and law go together.
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This is the Biblical
idea of love and law James.
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Our popular culture, if you
listen to the radio on any given
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day, or you pick up a popular
music CD you are definitely
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going to get to
hear the word love a lot.
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In fact I saw one magazine
article that said that they did
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a search on all the modern
popular music, and they found
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that the most frequently used
word, in popular music, is love.
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And they said the second most
frequently used word, is baby.
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As in baby I love you.
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And the third most frequently
used word, in popular music,
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is yeah, as in Oh Yeah!
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So baby I love you Oh Yeah!
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But that's track one on any
given CD, but track two or three
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I don't love you baby anymore,
because I've moved onto another
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baby, but, that has been more,
you know, attractive than you
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that I love more now.
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And so it looks like modern
the modern perception of love
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is that love really
is self-satisfaction.
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But! The Biblical idea of love,
is that love is self-sacrifice.
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1 Corinthians Chapter 13
verses 5-7 says that love is
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not self-seeking, or as King
James version renders it, that
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"Love seeketh not it's own. "
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And if love is not seeking it's
own, if love is not self-seeking
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stated in a positive
sense, that means that
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love is other-centered,
it is self-giving.
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That is the
Biblical idea of love.
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That's the essence of love.
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Now we've got law in
the new covenant experience.
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We've got gospel in the
new covenant experience.
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We've got power in the
new covenant experience.
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We've got relationship in
the new covenant experience.
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We've got anointing in
the new covenant experience.
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Let's look at this aspect of the
gospel, I think it is found here
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in verse 12 of Hebrews Chapter 8
it says, "For I will be merciful
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to their unrighteousness
and their sins and iniquities
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I will remember no more. "
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What is that talking about?
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Well these two things need
to be joined together James.
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The law of God being written
in our hearts and in our minds.
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And the mercy and forgiveness
that God bestows upon us.
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Whenever I think about the new
covenant, I think of the women
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caught in adultery in
Chapter 8 of the gospel of John,
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and her experience because she
personifies a living experience
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of what the new
covenant is all about.
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Because Jesus said to her "
I don't condemn you", that's
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forgiveness, that's the mercy
aspect of the plan of salvation
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in the gospel, then He said,
now, "go and sin no more. "
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It's futile for us to think in
terms of going to sin no more,
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unless we are living in the
light of God's non-condemning
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love for us,
that's were the power is.
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I don't condemn you, now
go in the light of that love
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that I have for
you and sin no more.
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So a vital aspect of this
new covenant experience is the
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mercy of God, the
empowering mercy of God.
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The grace of God that empowers
us to live a different life.
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We cannot have any kind of
law put into our hearts into
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our minds without recognizing
first, that God is going
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to take care of our guilt.
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That God has
taken care of our sins,
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that He's purged them by
Himself and that the essence
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of what God is offering
us is mercy and acceptance
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in spite of ourselves.
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And that empowers us,
as it did with this women,
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caught in the act of adultery.
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It empowers to go
forth and sin no more.
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Sin being friends, the
transgression of the law,
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according to 1 John 3, verse 4.
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But before we get to a
revelation of the law of God,
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we have, as you pointed out
in Exodus, we have a revelation
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of the delivering power of God.
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Of the blood of Jesus Christ.
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Written on the door posts,
along the lentils, the blood
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of Jesus Christ that
covers us, forgives us,
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that is merciful toward us.
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This is new covenant theme.
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The next aspect of the new
covenant that Paul brings to
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our attention here
that we want to focus on,
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is in verse 11, where he
says, "None of them shall teach
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his neighbor, and none his
brothers, saying no the Lord
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For all shall know Me from
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the least of them
to the greatest. "
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So here is a personal intimate
relationship with God that each
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individual has, so
that evangelistic witness,
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so to speak, at some point
becomes unnecessary because
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your already in a
personal relationship with God.
00:10:10.46\00:10:13.06
That doesn't mean we
don't testify and share with one
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another after we
have come to Christ
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and accepted the gospel.
00:10:17.87\00:10:19.59
But now we are in a personal one
on one relationship with God.
00:10:19.62\00:10:23.78
We have the anointing of
God's Spirit upon us and God is
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speaking in our own hearts.
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You know this is so
powerful because this was
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a failure in the old covenant.
00:10:31.33\00:10:32.35
When the Old covenant was
given at Sinai, the people were
00:10:32.38\00:10:35.53
confronted with Moses
whose face was bright and shiny,
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and when they saw Moses come
down from that mountain it was
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filled with thunder and
lightening, and they pulled
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back and they were scared.
00:10:44.77\00:10:45.77
They said, they said, Moses you
talk to us, you tell us what God
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said but don't have
God talk to us anymore.
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In other words they weren't
willing to engage in that
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personal relationship with God.
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They wanted a mediator, they
wanted someone to stand between
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them and God, a human being
to stand between them and God
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and we can do the same today
friends, with Pastors, with
00:11:02.97\00:11:05.77
preachers, we can follow
people instead of following God.
00:11:05.80\00:11:08.57
That is not God's
purpose for the new covenant.
00:11:08.60\00:11:11.35
God wants us personally to
engage with Him so that He can
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teach us personally.
00:11:15.13\00:11:16.21
So they promised to obey God's
law, but they did not enter into
00:11:16.25\00:11:21.93
a vital living relationship
with God that would empower
00:11:21.96\00:11:25.02
them to actually
be able to do it.
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They were not willing to
be personally taught of God.
00:11:26.84\00:11:29.03
Now this is so powerful, in
the New Testament you find this
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especially in 1 John Chapter 2.
00:11:32.19\00:11:34.62
In 1 John Chapter 2, Paul here
excuse me, John here is speaking
00:11:34.65\00:11:39.74
about the anointing we
are to have from the Holy One.
00:11:39.77\00:11:42.46
1 John Chapter 2 and verse 20.
00:11:42.49\00:11:44.74
Listen to these verses, it says,
"But Ye have an unction from
00:11:44.77\00:11:47.30
the Holy One and
you know all things. "
00:11:47.34\00:11:50.44
Now what is so powerful here s
that the truth of the matter is
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none of us know all things.
00:11:53.82\00:11:55.25
But the Holy
Spirit knows all things.
00:11:55.28\00:11:56.80
And the Holy Spirit is
promised to teach us all things.
00:11:56.83\00:12:00.15
The Holy Spirit wants us
not to become man dependant.
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That doesn't mean there is
not a place for teachers, and
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and preachers and Pastors.
00:12:05.32\00:12:06.29
There's place for them.
00:12:06.30\00:12:07.27
But we are not to be of a Paul
or Cephas, of Cephas or Paul.
00:12:07.28\00:12:10.58
We are to be of Christ,
we are to follow Christ.
00:12:10.61\00:12:13.03
He is the great teacher.
00:12:13.06\00:12:14.28
And God is promising each of
us we can have this anointing.
00:12:14.31\00:12:17.71
We can know Him personally.
00:12:17.75\00:12:19.15
He can teach us personally.
00:12:19.18\00:12:20.55
I really like this word in
verse 11 of Hebrews Chapter 8.
00:12:20.58\00:12:25.45
Know, everyone will know the
Lord, it shows up in a number
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of places in Scripture.
00:12:29.38\00:12:30.35
And the first time we see it in
Genesis 4 where Adam knew Eve.
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She gave birth to a son.
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It's a word of intimacy.
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Jesus used the word when
He said that eternal life
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is to know God.
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And now Paul uses
it and tells us it is a
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part of the new covenant.
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To enter into personal
intimate relationship with God.
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The law of God written
in our hearts and minds.
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The gospel forgiveness.
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The power of God to
empower this relationship.
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The relationship we have
with God so we don't rely on man
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But we rely on the
anointing of the Holy Spirit.
00:12:58.15\00:13:00.78
This is the essence, this is
principles of the new covenant
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experience of what
God is calling us to.
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Of what Paul is pointing
us to in Hebrews Chapter 8.
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This is to be the
experience that God wants us
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to have with Him.
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That God wants
you to have with Him.
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And He is calling you to
that experience right now.
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Don't neglect it!
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